PURCHASE, N.Y.—During a second quarter earnings call, Mastercard confirmed it will cut about 1,000 employees as part of a restructuring to focus on international markets.
The company hadn’t previously disclosed that it would reduce its workforce as part of a $190 million charge related to the restructuring, Payments Dive reported.
The reduction will affect about 3% of the global card network’s full-time workforce, and the majority of notifications to employees will take place in the current quarter, so by the end of next month, the company said in a statement, according to Payments Dive.
“As is our normal practice, we will provide support to everyone impacted by these actions,” a statement from a spokesperson said.
No Specifics Provided
The spokesperson declined to specify in which parts of the world the workforce reductions would most affect workers.
“Mastercard employed 33,400 employees globally as of the end of last year, with most of those workers being full-time, according to the company’s annual filing in February,” Payments Dive reported. “About 67% of those employees were based outside the U.S., in some 80 countries, the filing said. Mastercard’s workforce cost for last year was $6 billion, including the expense of about 4,600 contractors for the year.”
Payment Passkey Service Being Launched
Separately, Mastercard said it is launching a new Payment Passkey Service in an effort to make online shopping more secure and easier.
Debuting first in India as a pilot with some of the nation’s largest payments players, including payment aggregators such as Juspay, Razorpay and PayU, online merchants such as bigbasket and leading banks such as Axis Bank, the service will “give millions of consumers more control and peace of mind when checking out online,” Mastercard said in a statement.
‘Increasingly Vulnerable’
“Despite the rising popularity of one-time passwords (OTPs) due to their ease of use, they are increasingly vulnerable to online scams such as phishing, SIM swapping and message interception,” the company said. “In India, the incidence of fraud cases has surged by nearly 300% in the last two years, as reported by the Reserve Bank of India’s Annual Report for 2023-2024.”
Payment passkeys use device-based biometric authentication methods, such as fingerprints or facial scans, but for an entirely new purpose: to streamline online shopping experiences, Mastercard said.
‘Say Goodbye’
“By replacing traditional passwords and OTPs, the Mastercard Payment Passkey Service makes transactions not only faster, but also more secure against fraud and scams,” Mastercard stated. “With payment passkeys, consumers can say goodbye to the hassle of forgetting or accidentally sharing their passwords or OTPs.”
According to Mastercard, the Payment Passkey Service uses tokenization to secure a consumer’s payment details and biometric data, ensuring that no data is shared with third parties and is useless to fraudsters and scammers.
How it Works
According to Mastercard:
- Shoppers choose their Mastercard when checking out as a guest or select a card already stored securely on file with a merchant
- To confirm the payment, users can use biometric authentication mechanism features on their device – whether it’s a fingerprint, face scan or PIN
- Upon successful authentication, the payment is instantly completed